The "unpredictability" adds to the fun of the game IMHO, it's like the game says 2-4 but you get a 1-6. But after a while you get the hang of it and your game experience starts to kick in, so you can add your own gut feeling to the game- prediction, then the actual battle results won't vary from your expectations as much anymore. You *still* might get an unpleasant surprise every once in while, losing 3 instead of 1 ... still, adds to gamefun. I do however have the impression that early on in the game, with inexperienced troops, the randomness of battle results can be quite deadly indeed. With your troops getting more experienced they start to become more resilient to a bad roll. So the best thing to do for you, IMO, is play more, set maybe a lower difficulty level, and save and reload often. No shame in reloading because this is not War in the East where losses are granted and can be replaced... you cannot afford to lose all of a sudden a three star fighter ... that's a catastrophic loss because you really need four-five stars fighters at the end to stand a fighting chance.